Incomplete period
A day, week or month in a report for which not all data exists yet, usually the latest one.
Formulacompare only periods with the same amount of data
Try it · 30 seconds · from Atterna’s practice
| week | paid orders |
|---|---|
| 1 | 2,625 |
| 2 | 2,751 |
| 3 | 3,289 |
| 4 | 406 |
Orders fell 88% in week 4. What happened?
Preparing the practice…
How we work it through
- 1
Find where the data ends: MAX of the timestamp.
- 2
Drop the partial period or compare the same partial window of earlier ones.
- 3
Say it in the chart title, not only in a footnote.
On the practice dataset
The query we run on Meridian, Atterna’s practice marketplace, and what it returns.
SELECT date_trunc('week', created_at) AS week, COUNT(*)
FROM meridian.orders
WHERE status = 'paid'
GROUP BY 1 ORDER BY 1;Result2,625 · 2,751 · 3,289 · 406 — the data ends at 03:40 on 22 September
The common trap
Reading it as a collapse.
ExampleMeridian weekly paid orders: 2,625 · 2,751 · 3,289 · 406 — the last week has only its Monday and a few hours of Tuesday.
When an AI answers
“Orders dropped 88% week over week.”
- What it didn’t know
- It did not know the export was taken at 03:40 on the week’s second day.
- Ask back
- “Is the latest week complete? Compare only the same partial window of earlier weeks.”
Read next
Examples use Meridian, Atterna’s fictional practice marketplace.